Ok, so the picture’s a little dramatic, but it adds up to the same thing – my three-year-old Dell XPS 700 is probably hosed.
Tim with the Geek Squad called this morning with the bad news: I need a new motherboard ($200+$300 labor) and there’s no guarantee that the motherboard failure hasn’t fried the processor (another $200 or so). So that’s at least $500 plus the $200 I paid Friday for a copy of Windows 7 to get me where I want to be. And I would still have a mostly three-year-old computer that may have other stuff on the verge of failure.
He says he can put me into a comparable system at Best Buy for $800-$900 and that’s with Windows 7 already installed, so I could return the unopened package and knock $200 off the out-of-pocket cost, so we’re talking about an additional expense of $600-$700.
I told him I need to think about it.
The first thing I need to do is go to the Dell web site and see what kind of system I can put together that will have the capabilities I want for less than what I’d pay at Best Buy. That scenario also lets me return the Windows 7 package for a $200 refund.
Anyone have any other suggestions (no Macs, please)?
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